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Learner Reviews & Feedback for Operating Systems and You: Becoming a Power User by Google

4.7
stars
28,168 ratings

About the Course

In this course -- through a combination of video lectures, demonstrations, and hands-on practice -- you’ll learn about the main components of an operating system and how to perform critical tasks like managing software and users, and configuring hardware. By the end of this course you’ll be able to: ● navigate the Windows and Linux filesystems using a graphical user interface and command line interpreter ● set up users, groups, and permissions for account access ● install, configure, and remove software on the Windows and Linux operating systems ● configure disk partitions and filesystems ● understand how system processes work and how to manage them ● work with system logs and remote connection tools ● utilize operating system knowledge to troubleshoot common issues in an IT Support Specialist role...

Top reviews

JA

Jun 21, 2019

Great course, lots of very challenging and useful information. You'll learn about Linux and some of the inner workings of Windows, plus lots of tools and programs that are really useful. Great course!

SG

Nov 27, 2021

Great course, lots of very challenging and useful information. You'll learn about Linux and some of the inner workings of Windows, plus lots of tools and programs that are really useful. Great course!

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4876 - 4900 of 5,443 Reviews for Operating Systems and You: Becoming a Power User

By Eric M

Nov 4, 2020

Far too much for a beginner to remember well enough to finish in under one hour. I can't help but wonder if this might be a 'bottleneck' where a lot of students get hopelessly stuck and lost and are forced to give up. I appreciate y'all's efforts, it's just that repetition is the mother of all learning, and these tasks were only touched upon. Even if the course has to be made longer, it's vital to guide beginners through a lot of repetition and practice before expecting them to do a lab such as this. Thank you

By Jeffrey C

Mar 3, 2022

A decent intro course, but don't expect to have mastered anything when finished. The course doesn't offer enough challenges and opportunities to practice what it teaches. The week 6 lab was how all the labs should have been. It gives you an opportunity to apply the lessons being taught in an enviroment that doesn't completely spoon feed you everything and allows you to play and experiement. This course could be so much more, but unfortunately decides to appeal to everyone and keep it on easy mode.

By V R

Apr 9, 2024

5 stars for Cindy and the way she explains the information and 3 stars for the webpage, it is horrible. It would be better to have the video pop out of the page, and the coach logo (bottom right corner) is in the way of the transcript, you need to add a minimize button or hide option for that or keep it to the left with the module information if we need the coach, please redesign the page configuration so that video can be popped out of the webpage. thank you.

By Matthew S

Mar 14, 2024

This course was particularly lacking in presentation. The slides used in videos were often on word on an otherwise blank white background and were sometimes even single punctuation marks, with no title or supporting text to explain the single word (or punctuation mark). There were several errors in the videos, glitchy labs with poor instruction (lab 6 especially) and at least one test that had contradictory instructions resulting in a wrong answer.

By Christi H

Oct 31, 2022

The course is an overview of Operating Systems and has good information. However, many of the labs were ill-constructed and difficult to understand and navigate. Further, some of the tasks in the labs were not covered in the course. I rated the labs and sent feedback on these areas. Prior to beginning one, I read many students' reviews and they had the same to say. I feel the labs need to be reviewed for accuracy of information and instruction.

By Michael K R

Apr 25, 2018

It was OK. The Windows labs frankly made it a pretty miserable experience. From logging in frustrations to actual frustrations with the way the labs failed constantly. I realize that this is an entry level course but it seemed like most of the meat of the course was in the readings and not covered in the lectures. It really should be labelled Becoming a Basic Problem Solver not a power user. I enjoy these courses but this one, not so much.

By Natalya V

Mar 1, 2024

Very disorganized structure of course presentation, too much useless information that has nothing to do with lesson/subject. Also, what kind of reputation coursera has when so called "instructor" said: "sorry i just lied to you few seconds ago"?, also there was some misleading instruction in videos, when I was trying to follow them.. it just DIDN'T WORK!!!!! I hope that you will improve explaining the materials better and efficiently.

By Seth G

Apr 16, 2018

Useful information that was taught fine, but the labs made the learning process seem frustrating. You'd learn a lot of useful information in the lectures, but when you reached the labs, it was normally something simple, like creating a folder or moving a file. It didn't help that the labs themselves were frustratingly broken at times. Starting a 60 minute lab and not being able to access it for ten minutes was very, very annoying.

By StaticShock234

Aug 2, 2020

Some of the labs were difficult to understand at first. Tried talking to my dad for clarification. Then I turned to the web and looking back at some of the labs to understand what to do. Still got lost and checked around again. Found what needed to be done. But in the end, got everything else done. Overall, I would say make the instructions in all the labs more clearer. Otherwise people will get lost and not know what to do next.

By Joseph T

Jan 7, 2023

The instructions were good.; but I found something wrong with the labs. the Week 6 labs were glitched. I know the commands but somehow the labs said that the files in question were not present. I tried for 40 mins to change file permissions; but got the file directory not found. To terminate a process, had a hard time finding the pid, and when I did, pid was not found or didn't have permission for the termination.

By Ryan H

Mar 5, 2018

The Qwiklabs!!! they can be the worst. So much wasted time to try and get those things to get scores correct. They give you an hour or more to do the lab but it takes like 30 mins to get the lab setup. You have to sit and wait for the VM to load all the content and sometimes they are missing content.

so if you start this course look at the forums before each lab and see what others are doing to get the passing scores

By Jeremy B

Nov 13, 2020

all the command line stuff was glossed over...which is fine, you can do the same stuff probably faster than typing with gui anyway. but really, a lot of the flags and commands werent even mentioned except cut and paste for the exercises. fair introduction but definitely wont stick. ill still have to look up commands if i want to use command line, which i dont. and a basic IT support person probably wont either.

By Scott L

Jan 24, 2021

This is a critical component but I found that the supporting lectures were not as organized or as evenly covered as expected. The courses should come with downloadable documentation to support self-study and practice. The Google presenters are very good but the problem-solving approaches are not covered enough in detail to practice or apply. This is the biggest gap in the course design and training so far.

By Alix M

Feb 7, 2019

Enjoying this course, but it is badly let down by the graded assignments. None of the Qwiklabs work very well at all. You can see from the forums that so many people have the same issues over and over again but nothing appears to be done about it. It tells you you've failed, even though you know you had 100% and if you close Coursera down and log back in, it's changed to a pass. It causes untold grief.

By Patrick C

Jun 2, 2020

The instructor goes way too fast. Tell us when you are including a space, a forward slash vs. a backslash. Too many times a command is typed in before we can even grasp it. Slow it down, because the only way for us to get this material is to continuously stop the video and take notes. The opinion from the instructor is "if you don't get it you can watch it again." That seems rather cavalier.

By Mario A

Mar 31, 2019

The entire course is great, except for the Lab in Week 6. The concept was a great one, allowing the user to figure out how to solve the problems, however, the testing method with the qwiklabs didn't seem to work like they should. The qwiklab support was great, they answered my emails immediately and I appreciated that. Overall, the course was above average, but the last lab was frustrating.

By Fred C

Dec 21, 2020

While it was great to learn, there needs some more interactive real world simulated practice. it was hard to follow Cindy when only she had the windows and linux that actually showed what was happening. I would have had an easier time if I had some sort of VM I could download to follow what she was doing. I still have two courses left so my mind remains open to the total experience

By Mike R

Feb 16, 2022

It’s all been said from what I read. I enjoyed learning what I could. The fast paced jumping from topic to topic and all the extra supplemental reading didn’t allow you to fully learn a concept and apply it before moving on. Sure, you got to create a few files, and move some things around, but this doesn’t seam like a sufficient learning format to be proficient in an I.T. role.

By Chris M

Jun 12, 2020

This one seemed to skip a bit of important details at times (like exactly what was being typed on the screen and why). Also, the resolution did not always allow one to see clearly the commands being typed and the transcript was not always accurate. Ms. Quach occasionally typed something that she didn't say aloud so you couldn't see it on the screen or read it in the transcript.

By Jason B

Sep 16, 2019

Though I did learn quite a bit about command lines in PowerShell and Bash. I wish the presentation of the videos was a lot better. I would recommend placing greater focus on the commamd line interface than the instructor, and to display it a greater resolution. I would also like to see a greater emphasis on explaining the details and functions of the command lines as well.

By Earl W

Dec 2, 2020

I had a problem with trying to understand the update VLC part of the lab. I'm not real happy about that an will probably go back to review the material regarding updating. Is it that I was suppose to install the VLC in both the Windows and Linux labs, this was unclear. I really need some help in understanding what I should have done to complete that part of the lab.

By Rhonda S

Dec 19, 2021

There were issues with every single qwiklab. The instructor was knowledgeable but her programs were already installed so difficult to follow along. My home version of powershell does not work the same as the instructor and does not allow me to perform the same tasks. The information does not match what is on the average Windows 10 computer purchased summer of 2021

By Antony J

Aug 17, 2020

I've done a few Google courses and this one seemed to have the most problematic labs. Perhaps it's something to do with having so many subscribers, but --- rightly or wrongly --- the bad experiences tend to be the ones you remember the most. I also felt that this course was over-reliant on the message "we won't cover it, but take a look at the attached reading".

By Rocklyn K

Oct 16, 2021

This is by far the most confusing model so far. I couldn't follow the instruction properly and had to use multiple resources to get this done. Also, for new learners who are actually serious about figuring this out on their own, the quota has to go or reset after 24 hours because we need to actually learn by practicing and making mistakes on qwiklab. Thank you

By Jason B

Feb 27, 2019

I only gave it 3 stars because the content was not that interesting to me (I preferred the networking course, and am looking forward to the security one). It was also 3 stars because of all the trouble and time wasted with Qwiklabs not working properly. They need to scrap that platform and start over. I would have been done with this course a long time ago.